Bacolod launches 45th Masskara Festival

“Make it better than last year.”

This was stressed by Bacolod City Mayor Alfredo Abelardo Benitez during the launching of the 45th MassKara Festival 2024 led by the Bacolod Yuhum Foundation, Inc. at the L'Fisher Hotel on Saturday, August 17.

The activity was also attended by the members of the City Council and its sponsors.

The Bacolod Yuhum Foundation, Inc., the overall organizer of the 2024 MassKara Festival, also launched this year’s logo and theme “Sapphire Celebration.”

Benitez said since 2022, MassKara has been the forefront festival of the country.

“All of these efforts to bring people from other places is all for the city itself, for the benefit of all Bacolodnons. We're working with a TV station to widen the reach of the festival and bring more tourists,” he said.

He added that this year, they’ve been receiving more interest coming from several sponsors.

The mayor noted that the city is expanding the platform of the MassKara where it will be covered by a television network as well as in social media, among others so that people will be able to enjoy and watch the festival.

“Our goal every MassKara is to upstage or to make our current MassKara celebration much better compared to last year, so with the interest coming from various groups that they would like to participate, I think this year will be bigger MassKara Festival,” Benitez said.

He said they aimed to make the MassKara Festival to become a sought-after global event.

He added the city government also provided P11 million to the foundation and he’s hopeful that this year, the foundation will not experience a deficit in its collections.

The financial report of the Bacolod Yuhum Foundation Inc. for the MassKara Festival 2023, which was submitted to the City Council, still showed a deficit in its collections. They earned at least P70 million, but their expenses reached at least P80 million and the mayor paid for other expenses.

In the 2022 MassKara Festival, the Bacolod Yuhum Foundation Inc. earned at least P80 million, but they were short of at least P6 million, with the mayor also paying for other expenses.

Moreover, Katherine Matiling, president and festival director for finance, said they will also have a new music video that will be released soon.

She said the festival will start on October 11 until October 27.

Meanwhile, the foundation also identified the four festival sites include the Bacolod City Government Center, Bacolod Public Plaza, Lacson Tourism Strip, and Megaworld’s The Upper East./MAP